Directorate Change

Ford Motor Co
05 September 2006



Contact:   Oscar Suris
           313-594-1106
           [e-mail]

FORD NAMES BOEING'S ALAN MULALLY PRESIDENT & CEO; BILL FORD IS EXECUTIVE 
CHAIRMAN

• Mulally led turnaround of the commercial airplane division of The Boeing
  Company. He has a record of success in manufacturing, product development, 
  labor relations, supplier management and customer satisfaction. 

• Bill Ford, as executive chairman, will concentrate efforts on strategic
  repositioning of Ford Motor Company. 

DEARBORN, Mich., Sept. 5 - Ford Motor Company announced today that it has
elected Alan Mulally as president and chief executive officer. He has also been
elected to the Board of Directors. 

Bill Ford will continue his duties as executive chairman of the company. 

'One of the three strategic priorities that I've focused on this year is company
leadership. While I knew that we were fortunate to have outstanding leaders
driving our operations around the world, I also determined that our turnaround
effort required the additional skills of an executive who has led a major
manufacturing enterprise through such challenges before,' Bill Ford wrote in an
email to Ford employees today. 

'That's why I'm very pleased to announce that Alan Mulally, who turned around
the Commercial Airplanes division of The Boeing Company, will become our
president and CEO effective immediately. Alan has deep experience in customer
satisfaction, manufacturing, supplier relations and labor relations, all of
which have applications to the challenges of Ford. He also has the personality
and team-building skills that will help guide our Company in the right
direction.' 

Bill Ford, who said he would remain 'extremely active' in the business, praised
Mulally as 'an outstanding leader and a man of great character.' He noted that
Mulally had applied many of the lessons from Ford's success in developing the
Taurus to Boeing's creation of the revolutionary Boeing 777 airliner. That
experience, chronicled in the book, 'Working Together,' by James P. Lewis, tells
how the leadership principles Mulally learned from Ford and developed at Boeing
may be applied to other businesses. 

'Clearly, the challenges Boeing faced in recent years have many parallels to our
own,' Bill Ford said. 

Mulally, 61, has spent 37 years at The Boeing Company, most recently as
executive vice president. In addition, he has also been president and chief
executive officer of Boeing Commercial Airplanes since 2001. In that position he
was responsible for all of the company's commercial airplane programs and
related services, which in 2005 generated record orders for new business and
sales of more than $22.6 billion. Mulally was named president of Commercial
Airplanes in September 1998. The responsibility of chief executive officer for
the business unit was added in March 2001. 

'I think the opportunity to work with Bill Ford and Ford Motor Company is the
only thing that could have attracted me to a job other than Boeing, where I have
so many great friends and memories,' Mulally said. 'I'm looking forward to
working closely with Bill in the ongoing turnaround of this great Company. I'm
also eager to begin engagement with the leadership team. I believe strongly in
teamwork and I fully expect that our efforts will be a productive
collaboration.' 

Mulally noted that many of the challenges he encountered in commercial airplane
manufacturing are analogous to the issues at Ford. 

'Just as I thought it was appropriate to apply lessons learned from Ford to
Boeing, I believe the reverse is true as well,' Mulally said. 'I also recognize
that Ford has a strong foundation upon which we can build. The Company's long
tradition of innovation, developing new markets, and creating iconic vehicles
that represent customer values is a great advantage that we can leverage for our
future.' 

Bill Ford said he expected Mulally would assist Mark Fields and the Way Forward
team as they accelerate their business plan. 

'After dealing with the troubles at Boeing in the post-9/11 world, Alan knows
what it's like to have your back to the wall - and fight your way out with a
well-conceived plan and great execution,' Bill Ford said in his note to
employees. 'He also knows how to deal with long product cycles, changing fuel
prices and difficult decisions in a turnaround.' 

Prior to his current position, Mulally served as president of Boeing
Information, Space & Defense Systems and senior vice president of The Boeing
Company. Appointed to that role in February 1997, he was responsible for
Boeing's defense, space and government business. 

Beginning in 1994, he was senior vice president of Airplane Development for
Boeing Commercial Airplanes Group, responsible for all airplane development
activities, flight test operations, certification and government technical
liaison. 

Mulally serves as co-chair of the Washington Competitiveness Council, and sits
on the advisory boards of NASA, the University of Washington, the University of
Kansas, Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the U.S. Air Force Scientific
Advisory Board. He is a member of the United States National Academy of
Engineering and a fellow of England's Royal Academy of Engineering. 

Mulally holds bachelor's and master's of science degrees in aeronautical and
astronautical engineering from the University of Kansas, and earned a master's
in management from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology as a 1982 Alfred P.
Sloan fellow. 

A member of the board since 1988, Bill Ford, 49, was elected chairman in
September 1998, and took office on Jan. 1, 1999. He also serves as chairman of
the board's Environmental and Public Policy Committee and as a member of the
Finance Committee. He was named Chief Executive Officer on Oct. 30, 2001. 

Bill Ford, who led the Company to three straight years of profitability through
2005, told employees in his email that he looked forward to an excellent working
partnership with Mulally on global strategic issues. 

'Let me assure you: I'm not going anywhere,' Bill Ford wrote to Ford workers.
'As executive chairman, I intend to remain extremely active in the direction of
this Company. I'll be here every day and I will not rest until a prosperous
future for this Company is secured.' 

Sept. 5, 2006

Go to http://media.ford.com for news releases and high-resolution photographs.


                      This information is provided by RNS
            The company news service from the London Stock Exchange